What I'm trying to tell you is that when you say "Debian should" you are referring to your own personal point of view, which is commendable and I can totally relate to but is ultimately incorrect.Jamie should just use a different license if he wants his work to be used in a particular way.

The free license allows Debian and anyone else to politely ignore his plea.This is where you are getting lost.

Think about this way: I get you a television set for your birthday and bring it to you at your party. After you unwrap it I tell you that I would like you to only watch reruns of "Magnum PI" on it.Is that a gift anymore? Or is it a guilt trap?In order to comply with my plea you either have to keep a useless object in your home or not accept my present.You certainly don't want that.

Now, free software is not like a birthday gift per se, but in a similar way a developer gifts other users with his work and accepts that, just like you are going to watch everything you like on the tv set, users are going to do everything (within the boundaries of the license) they want with his program.

spacex wrote:Or the best solution would obviously be if Debian could become a little flexible, and accept newer versions of some apps in Stable. The "not likely to change" policy is just stupid. When a newer version is better, stable enough, and is no threat to the stability of the system, then the new version should be accepted in stable. Period.

This is an entirely different matter.Even if changing Debian's policies would probably make this issue of outdated versions of Xscreensaver go away, the argument here is about what happened, not how things would be if they were different.

spacex wrote:But then again, it's no secret that I disagree with the Debian policy and cycle. Debian should pick up the pace, and have a new release every 12 months. That would put Debian somewhere in between where Debian is now, and Ubuntu, in terms of being current. Still more conservative than Ubuntu, but not as stale and outdated as today.

Not that I need it, because I can use testing/unstable, but you can't present something as outdated as Jessie to desktop users, and then warn them about testing/unstable. In that case, Debian should warn desktop users against Debian all together. Actually, I think that Debian should divide into two different releases. One conservative server-edition, and one more current desktop-edition.

But why?It really baffles me when I hear this because there is really no need in the world for Debian to become something it isn't or, as you suggest, to double efforts and make a version of itself that is already available in many of the hundreds distros out there.

The way I see these attempts to change how Debian works, is like seeing someone trying to change -say- a tractor into a commuting vehicle.Let's imagine Debian as a tractor, happily spending its days working the fields with plows and harvesters, then someone comes along, sees it and likes it because it is after all a good machine, that someone then starts using it even to go to his office downtown, but commuting is not as smooth. So he thinks that having different tires and maybe a bigger cabin with backseats for the kids would make it a much better and more practical ride, along with a few modifications to the aerodynamics and maybe different gear ratios, and the shocks and a nicer body, maybe a new paintjob.Yeah, that's much better now, but it no longer is the tractor it was in the beginning.

You can even picture the analogy the other way around with Debian being a sedan and someone trying to use it in the fields, the point is the same: Debian is what it is and people use it exactly because it is Stable and "outdated" (aka very low maintenance) and that's its forte.If you change it because you want it to be more apt (pun intended) for a different demographic, then by all means do, make you own distro like many have already and be done with it.Nobody is forcing users to have Debian as their distro. If they like it but want it different then they want something else. And again, there are literally hundreds of choices out there.

Really, no need for Debian desktop edition or for any change in the policy, they already exist, they just do not have "Debian" in the name (well, some do, and most are "based on" anyway).

Yes mor, but these alternatives doesn't exist for all the newbies coming to Debian looking for something suitable for their desktops. Also, there isn't all that many Debian-derivatives that are more current than Debian itself. They are few and far between, and not very well-known. Siduction is probably the most well-known of them. But it isn't something the mainstream population has heard about.

As for making my own "distro", I've already done that, and haven't been using anything besides my own distro for quite some time now. But that's besides the point, because it's not me I'm worried about.

Why do I stick with it if I dislike it as much? Because of "Live-Build". Easy as that really. But now that the live-build team has been pushed away, and the project pretty much is abandoned. I guess it isn't much of an argument anymore. I'm waiting to see what the live-wrapper team is able to accomplish, before I make the final decision whether to stay or leave. If I need to find an alternative to live-build, I might just as well do it somewhere else. In Arch for example.

spacex wrote:Yes mor, but these alternatives doesn't exist for all the newbies coming to Debian looking for something suitable for their desktops.

Try to think about the last part of this sentence with the tractor analogy in mind: "people coming to a tractor dealership looking for a sedan or a minivan or other street car anyway".

That's the error. Debian is a distribution meant to be stable and low maintenance, people looking for the next long awaited feature of their apps are simply in the wrong place.Now, I understand why one that doesn't fit in the Debian's system would want to change things, but why would Debian and all those who, on the other hand, are with Debian exactly because of the way it is, want to change things?

And no, alternatives exist. What about Ubuntu and Mint or openSuse and Fedora?No doctor prescribed Debian to people who want fresher desktops.If people don't like Ubuntu's (and friends) policies with spyware and other shit like that, wouldn't it make much more sense to try and change Ubuntu's policies rather than mess with Debian's nature?

spacex wrote:Why do I stick with it if I dislike it as much?

Honestly that's not something that crossed my mind before. Now that you said it yes, I concur that Arch would be a more appropriate distro for someone who, like you, likes to be close to upstream.And don't get me wrong, I too like to be close to upstream, even though it is not the reason why I run Testing/Unstable. I always figured that if I didn't like Debian I would be running Arch.Also don't think it is because I don't like you criticizing Debian, actually I always welcome criticism (sensible and mature that is).

But this is completely OT because in this thread we are simply discussing the Xscreensaver matter.Regardless of how Debian does things, I believe that even though Zawinski had all the rights to make a plea, Debian has absolutely no obligations to comply. But even having had all the rights to make a plea, he then chose a childish (at best) way to protest and thus brought on himself any action that did, may or will blatantly ignore his plea.

Your overall preference for a snappier developmental model makes you partial in considering Jamie's plea binding, but in order to understand how something like a plea has no relevance in free software think about the exact opposite where a developer insists on keeping an outdated dependency on his package, that prevents it from being suitable for more up to date systems, and he pleas everyone to either use a "stable outdated system" or drop his program, but not to change the dependency.Or use your imagination and think about any unrealistic plea that any developer could attach to his work, similar to my tv set example.

Free software is used any day from people and for purposes that their respective developers wouldn't like, yet they don't plea, for instance, people of their opposite political view from using their software, or if they do, they know they can't do anything about it, and they're fine with it because ultimately software freedom is what's important.If I was a Debian project manager I wouldn't want any non free software company to use a server or even a personal computer with Debian on it for their sites, I could make a plea about it, but ultimately either I believe in the importance of software freedom and accept they will use Debian, or I don't.And I do.

I think that debian should include newest xscreensaver in stable distribution, I have already tried it and it works great, there is no bugs and I am aggree that debian should update most of his software.

andros705 wrote:I think that debian should include newest xscreensaver in stable distribution, I have already tried it and it works great, there is no bugs and I am aggree that debian should update most of his software.

Debian does update the software--just not as often as some people would like.

But if you want newer versions, there are other distros or repositories based on Stable that fulfil that desire, including the xscreensaver package.

mor wrote:Try to think about the last part of this sentence with the tractor analogy in mind: "people coming to a tractor dealership looking for a sedan or a minivan or other street car anyway".

That's the error. Debian is a distribution meant to be stable and low maintenance, people looking for the next long awaited feature of their apps are simply in the wrong place.Now, I understand why one that doesn't fit in the Debian's system would want to change things, but why would Debian and all those who, on the other hand, are with Debian exactly because of the way it is, want to change things?

==> Well, but perhaps you have read me wrong. Because my only issue with this, is that Debian does nothing to tell these users off, before they encounter a sour-puss in the community that tells them to go elsewhere if they want it new and shining. After they've already wasted time in Debian.

mor wrote:And no, alternatives exist. What about Ubuntu and Mint or openSuse and Fedora?No doctor prescribed Debian to people who want fresher desktops.If people don't like Ubuntu's (and friends) policies with spyware and other shit like that, wouldn't it make much more sense to try and change Ubuntu's policies rather than mess with Debian's nature?

==> Eh, there are lots of other reasons why I don't like any of the alternatives you are mentioning, and as far as changing the Ubuntu policies, get real

mor wrote:and he pleas everyone to either use a "stable outdated system" or drop his program, but not to change the dependency.

==> You mean like Debian pleas that we all should use a "stable outdated system(Jessie)" or drop Debian and go somewhere else

Actually, I set a different standard for a distribution like Debian, and end-users on Debian. End-users may do whatever to their own system, but Debian shouldn't distribute any programs against the developers wishes, regardless what it is licencensed under. If I was a developer that received treatment like this, I would do a hell of a lot more than just putting in a polite warning as a time-bomb.

But WE disagree because you all seem to mean that just because you have the right to do something, it's automatically right to go ahead and just do it. I for one are not only limited by laws and regulations, I am also limited by morals and ethics. If something feels wrong, then it is wrong, no matter what any license says.

Anyways, it will do Debian no good to piss off good developers. Not in the long run.

The first day I uploaded my network manager on git.devuan.org, it was immediately forked by another developer. Should I grumble and curse?

A license permitting the forking and editing of code is what it is: anyone who wants to restrict users from modifying code should publish only closed source projects or at least close source only the code he/she doesn't want to be modified.

Publishing source under certain license terms and then unexpectedly turning to users to refrain from some of those license terms, is also unethical, as it can be interpreted as deceptive on the part of the publisher/developer.

edbarx wrote:The first day I uploaded my network manager on git.devuan.org, it was immediately forked by another developer. Should I grumble and curse?

A license permitting the forking and editing of code is what it is: anyone who wants to restrict users from modifying code should publish only closed source projects or at least close source only the code he/she doesn't want to be modified.

Publishing source under certain license terms and then unexpectedly turning to users to refrain from some of those license terms, is also unethical, as it can be interpreted as deceptive on the part of the publisher/developer.

I don't disagree with this. Forking it is fine. Also that users change the code. But when you redistribute the package with those changes, it has to be clear that it is a modified version, and that the original developer in no way can be responsible for the package anymore. Nor be expected to offer any kind of support for such modified versions.